David Austin, CEO of the BBFC has been talking to Radio 4's Front Row about the BBFC's latest
public consultation.

Austin said Brits are becoming more desensitised over nudity in films and TV, with the censors planning to publish new guidelines in 2019. He told Front Row:

These days if you have an erection on screen, the issue is is it a 15 level erection or an 18 level erection.

We've been consulting with the public on this and in 2013, we liberalised slightly and we're now going back to the public as we speak and saying, 'have we got this right, have we done what you asked us to do in terms of how we classify erections.

It's clear from the research we're doing at the moment and were doing four/five years ago and to an extent before that that the public are relaxed about nudity and don't equate it to sex.

Austin told The Sun:

We speak to the public on a large scale every four to five years to get their views on age rating key issues like violence, drug misuse, sex and discrimination.

Our 2014 Guidelines review involved more than 10,000 members of the British public.

This ensures our classification guidelines reflect public expectations. We're out speaking to the public now and will be publishing our new guidelines in 2019.

Adults who want to watch online porn (or maybe by adults only products such as alcohol)
will be able to buy codes from newsagents and supermarkets to prove that they are over 18 when online.

One option available to the estimated 25 million Britons who regularly visit such websites will be a 16-digit code, dubbed a 'porn pass'.

While porn viewers will still be able to verify their age using methods such as registering credit card details, the 16-digit code option would be a fully anonymous option. According to AVSecure's the cards will be sold for £10 to anyone who looks
over 18 without the need for any further identification. It doesn't say on the website, but presumably in the case where there is doubt about a customer's age, then they will have to show ID documents such as a passport or driving licence, but
hopefully that ID will not have to be recorded anywhere.

It is hope he method will be popular among those wishing to access porn online without having to hand over personal details to X-rated sites.

The user will type in a 16 digit number into websites that belong to the AVSecure scheme. It should be popular with websites as it offers age verification to them for free (with the £10 card fee being the only source of income for the company).
This is a lot better proposition for websites than most, if not all, of the other age verification companies.

AVSecure also offer an encrypted implementation via blockchain that will not allow websites to use the 16 digit number as a key to track people's website browsing. But saying that they could still use a myriad of other standard technologies to
track viewers.

The BBFC is assigned the task of deciding whether to accredit different technologies and it will be very interesting to see if they approve the AVSecure offering. It is easily the best solution to protect the safety and privacy of porn viewers,
but it maybe will test the BBFC's pragmatism to accept the most workable and safest solution for adults which is not quite fully guaranteed to protect children. Pragmatism is required as the scheme has the technical drawback of having no further
checks in place once the card has been purchased. The obvious worry is that an over 18s can go around to other shops to buy several cards to pass on to their under 18 mates. Another possibility is that kids could stumble on their parent's card and
get access. Numbers shared on the web could be easily blocked if used simultaneously from different IP addresses.

The Internet Watch Foundation released its Annual Report covering 2017 on April 18, 2018 The The IWF searches for and removes online child sexual abuse imagery and the report shows that more of this disturbing material is being found than ever
before.

Whilst the IWF concentrates on its commendable work against child abuse images it does have a wider remit to censor adult content deemed to be criminally obscene, and also to censor cartoons and other non-photographic imagery sexually depicting
under 18s.

However in this annual report the IWF has announced that it no longer has any remit over adult porn. It writes:

6.4 Wider remit work

5,439 reports of alleged criminally obscene adult content were made to us. Almost all were not hosted in the UK, so they were not in our remit.

3,471 reports of alleged non-photographic images of child sexual abuse were made to us. None of these images were hosted in the UK, so they were not within our remit.

One URL depicted criminally obscene adult content hosted in the UK received from a public source.

On 1 August 2017, criminally obscene adult content hosted within the UK was removed from IWF’s remit.

Presumably that role now belongs to the new internet porn censors at the BBFC. Anyway it is surely good for the IWF to rid itself of that toxic task, so it can concentrate on its good work that is supported by more or less everyone.

The BBFC is consulting on its procedures for deciding if porn websites have implemented adequately strictly such that under 18s
won't normally be able to access the website. Any websites not complying will be fined/blocked and/or pressurised by hosting/payment providers and advertisers who are willing to support the BBFC censorship.

Now I'm sure that the BBFC will diligently perform their duties with fairness and consideration for all, but the trouble is that all the horrors of scamming, hacking, snooping, blackmail, privacy etc are simply not the concern of the BBFC. It is
pointless to point out how the age verification will endanger porn viewers, it is not in their remit.

If a foreign website were to implement strict age verification and then pass over all the personal details and viewing habits straight to its blackmail, scamming and dirty tricks department, then this will be perfectly fine with the BBFC. It is
only their job to ensure that under 18s won't get through the ID checking.

There is a little privacy protection for porn websites with a presence in the EU, as the new GDPR rues have some generic things to say about keeping data safe. However these are mostly useless if you give your consent to the websites to use your
data as they see fit. And it seems pretty easy to get consent for just about anything just be asking people to tick a box, or else not be allowed to see the porn. For example, Facebook will still be allowed to slurp all you personal data even
within the constraints of GDPR, so will porn websites.

As a porn viewer, the only person who will look after you, is yourself.

The woeful flaws of this bill need addressing (by the government rather than the BBFC). We need to demand of the government: Don't save the children by endangering their parents.

At the very least we need a class of critically private data that websites simply must not use, EVER, under any circumstances, for any reason, and regardless of nominal user consent. Any company that uses this critically private data must be
liable to criminal prosecution.

Anyway there have been a few contributions to the debate in the run up to the end of the BBFC consultation.

AgeID says it wants to set the record straight on user data privacy under pending UK smut age check rules. As soon as a customer enters their login credentials, AgeID anonymises them. This ensures AgeID does not have a list of email addresses. We
cannot market to them, we cannot even see them

[You always have to be a bit sceptical about claims that anonymisation protects your data. Eg if Facebook strips off your name and address and then sells your GPS track as 'anonymised', when in fact your address and then name can be restored by
noting that you spend 12 hours a day at 32 Acacia avenue and commute to work at Snoops R Us. Perhaps more to the point of PornHub, may indeed not know that it was Damian@Green.com that hashed to 00000666, but the browsing record of 0000666 will be
stored by PornHub anyway. And when the police come along and find from the ID company that Damian@Green.com
hashes to 0000666 then the can simply ask PornHub to reveal the browsing history of 0000666.

MindGeek's age verification solution, AgeID, will inevitably have broad takeup due to their using it on their free tube sites such as PornHub. This poses a massive conflict of interest: advertising is their main source of revenue, and they have a
direct profit motive to harvest data on what people like to look at. AgeID will allow them to do just that.

MindGeek have a terrible record on keeping sensitive data secure, and the resulting database will inevitably be leaked or hacked. The Ashley Madison data breach is a clear warning of what can happen when people's sex lives are leaked into the
public domain: it ruins lives, and can lead to blackmail and suicide. If this policy goes ahead without strict rules forcing age verification providers to protect user privacy, there is a genuine risk of loss of life.

French adult content producer Marc Dorcel has issued a plea for industry stakeholders to participate in a
public consultation on the U.K.'s upcoming age-verification system for adult content. The consultation period closes on Monday. The studio said the following about participation in the BBFC public consultation:

The time of a wild internet where everyone could get immediate and open access to porn seems to be over as many governments are looking for concrete solutions to control it.

U.K. is the first one to have voted a law regarding this subject and who will apply a total blockage on porn websites which do not age verify and protect minors. Australian, Polish and French authorities are also looking very closely into this
issue and are interested in the system that will be elected in the U.K.

BBFC is the organization which will define and manage the operation. In a few weeks, the BBFC will deliver the government its age-verification guidance in order to define and detail how age-verification should comply with this new law.

BBFC wants to be pragmatic and is concerned about how end users and website owners will be able to enact this measure.

The organization has launched an open consultation in order to collect the public and concerned professionals' opinion regarding this matter here
.

As a matter of fact, age-verification guideline involves a major challenge for the whole industry: age-verification processor cannot be considered neither as a gateway nor a toll. Moreover, it cannot be an instrument to gather internet users'
data or hijack traffic.

Marc Dorcel has existed since 1979 and operates on numerous platforms -- TV, mobile, press, web networks. We are used to regulation authorities.

According to our point of view, the two main requirements to define an independent age-verification system that would not serve specific corporate interests are: 1st requirement -- neither an authenticated adult, nor his data should belong to any
processor; 2nd requirement -- processor systems should freely be chosen because of their efficiency and not because of their dominant position.

We are also thinking that our industry should have two requests for the BBFC to insure a system which do not create dependency:

Any age-verification processor scope should be limited to a verification task without a user-registration system. As a consequence, processors could not get benefits on any data user or traffic control, customers' verified age would
independently be stored by each website or website network and users would have to age verify for any new website or network.

If the BBFC allows any age-verification processor to control a visitor data base and to manage login and password, they should commit to share the 18+ login/password to the other certified processors. As a consequence, users would only
have one age verification enrollment on their first visit of a website, users would be able to log in with the same login/password on any age verification system to prove their age, and verified adults would not belong to any processor to avoid
any dependency.

In those cases, we believe that an age-verification solution will act like a MPSP (multiple payment service provider) which processes client payments but where customers do not belong to payment processors, but to the website and where credit
card numbers can be used by any processor.

We believe that any adult company concerned with the future of our business should take part in this consultation, whatever his point of view or worries are.

Company chose to remove a scene of potentially dangerous imitable behaviour involving electricity in order to achieve a U classification. An uncut PG was available.

Summary Notes

The story of Rudolph, a thirteen year old vampire, whose clan is threatened by a notorious vampire hunter. He meets Tony, a mortal of the same age, who is fascinated by old castles, graveyards and - vampires. Tony helps Rudolph in an action and
humor packed battle against their adversaries, and together they save Rudolph's family and become friends.

Tom Jones is a 1963 UK comedy adventure by Tony Richardson.
Starring Albert Finney, Susannah York and George Devine.

The BBFC has just made the unusual decision to waive animal cruelty cuts. In this case the cuts were to a cockfight.

The BBFC does seem more likely these days to waive cuts to animal cruelty shown to be staged, but maybe this case is different in that the BBFC commented in 2003 that cuts to Tom Jones were r equired to sight of real animal cruelty
(cockfighting).

The BBFC has also uprated the age classification from the previous PG rating to a 12 rating this time.

An upcoming BFI release will feature the Theatrical Version and shorter Director's Cut and have both just been rated 12 for moderate sex references, violence, language

Censorship History

Passed X uncut by the BBFC for 1963 cinema release. BBFC have required animal cruelty cuts for all releases from 1971 until 2018 when the cuts were waived for home video release. The film exists in a longer original version and a shortened
Director's Cut. Both versions are available MPAA Unrated and so without censor cuts in the US.

Promotional Material

In the early 1960s, at the height of the British New Wave, a movement whose gritty realism they had helped establish, director Tony Richardson and playwright John Osborne set out for more fanciful narrative territory. Tom
Jones brings a theatrical flair to Henry Fielding s canonical eighteenth-century novel, boisterously chronicling the misadventures of the foundling of the title (Albert Finney, in a career-defining turn), whose easy charm seems to lead him astray
at every turn from his beloved, the wellborn Sophie Western (Susannah York). This spirited picaresque, evocatively shot in England s rambling countryside and featuring an extraordinary ensemble cast, went on to become a worldwide sensation,
winning the Oscar for best picture on the way to securing its status as a classic of irreverent wit and playful cinematic expression.

Update: Re the BBFC and faked/real animal cruelty

16th April 2018. Thanks to Jon

There was a foreign-language film from a few years back called A PIGEON SAT ON A BRANCH REFLECTING ON EXISTENCE, and that features scenes of a simian being experimented on and electrocuted!

The scenes had been faked by clever CGI and animatronics, but if you've seen the film, and didn't know that the cruelty was faked, it looks horrendously real, and abhorrent!

The film received a 12A rating (for disturbing images ) and the BBFC DIDN'T mention anything in the BBFC Advice about the cruelty. When I emailed them about it, they said as long as the cruelty is fake, they can and will pass it!

If animal cruelty has been faked, and the BBFC are shown evidence to backup that fakeness, then it can be passed, at any rating.

UK: Passed 18 for strong bloody violence, gore after some previous cuts waived but still with 1:55s of BBFC compulsory cuts for:

2018 Argent Films video

The BBFC commented:

Compulsory cuts required to sequences of real animal cruelty.

The previous submission to the BBFC was in 2001 when the video ended up with about 7 minutes of cuts. Just 6s of these cuts were formally required by the BBFC but the BBFC concurred with 6:51s of pre-cuts.

The 2001 BBFC cuts were:

Cut required to sight of small animal on end of rope banging against side of a jeep

From IMDb, the 2001 pre-cuts were:

Removed scene of coati being eaten by a snake whilst the adventurers look on.

Removed scene of a monkey being attacked by a jaguar.

Removed scene of iguana fending off snake

Removed scenes of Pat & Mike tormenting a native girl about being a virgin and then threatening to hurt her with a knife drawn across her naked breasts

Removed scene of live turtle having its head an legs chopped off.

Removed scene of Mike removing a native's eye with a knife.

Shortened scene of Joe getting speared and his innards becoming a cannibal feast.

Removed scene of Mike being castrated with a machete and then the natives eating the tasty morsel.

Removed flashback to Mike's ex-girl being kicked in the head.

Removed scene of a crocodile being killed and devoured by natives

Removed scenes of Mike's hand being chopped off.

When Zora Kerowa is killed, this edited version plays as though she has disappeared, never once showing either the actual event of the aftermath of the famous "hooks through the breasts" death.

After having his skull sliced off, cuts to natives eating his brains.

And previous to that, the video was banned on pre-cert VHS as one of the most notable of the video nasties.

Anthropologists take a trip to the jungles of Colombia to study native cannibals. Instead, they find a band of drug dealers, using the natives to harvest coca leaves. After awhile, the natives are tired of being tortured slaves, and turn on their
masters, as well as the anthropologists, thus filling the screen with gruesome splatter!

Originally released in the US in 1993 to much puzzlement and shock, a rare 35mm print of Urotsukidoji: Legend of the Overfiend will screen at Nitehawk (136 Metropolitan Avenue, Williamsburg, Brooklyn) on April 6 and 7.

The occasion generates a recap of censorship history in the US and UK:

The film's notoriety lies in its extreme violence and visceral visuals. The film's women get the worst treatment; female students are lecherously lensed, starting with scenes of half-clothed locker room horseplay and continuing in excessive
up-skirt shots. Maimed and mutilated female bodies randomly litter the background of other scenes. Perhaps the most prominent atrocities are the repeated scenes of rape, with the film's most infamous attack featuring phallic tentacles accosting
and probing an unwilling victim. This tentacled violation, which occurs in an early scene, is often cited as the representative moment of this feature-length depravity.

Urotsukidoji was initially released in three parts, between 1987 and 1989, as an original video animation (or OVA), ie it was not made as a broadcast TV series.

The first part was released in the US edited into a feature length film after 30 minutes of censor cuts for material deemed too extreme for the US. It ended up being rated NC-17. The film gained a reputation as the cinematic obscenity that forged
the stereotype that All Anime Is Naughty Tentacles .